The continual movement and development of technology has affected many businesses as well as consumers. As technology develops, products and older technologies become outdated, outmoded, obsolete and phased out over time. Often older technologies become unsupported due to the lack of availability of products for implementing or utilizing those technologies and/or with respect to the availability of replacement parts for the products. For example, in the 1970s 8-Track music players were very popular and many consumers purchased 8-Track players and 8-Track tapes. By the mid-1980s virtually all sources of 8-Track tapes (except for the used market) had vanished and no companies were manufacturing or selling 8-Track players any longer. However, many consumers who had collections of 8-Track tapes were left with no recourse upon breakage or damage to their 8-Track players. Those consumers had no recourse but to purchase entirely new music collections or, if lucky enough, to transfer their 8-Track collections to a different format, such as cassette tape prior to damage to their 8-Track players.
The extinction of the media formats for works of authorship, for example, 8-Track, and other formats placed and places an unfair burden on consumers who have already paid for certain rights in the work of authorship contained in or on the purchased medium. The consumer purchasing a work of authorship, irrespective of the type of medium, has already paid for many rights, including, for example, artist royalties, producer royalties, writer royalties, and mechanical royalties and for the record company marketing costs. Upon obsolescence of a particular medium or technology, such as, for example, 8-Track, the consumer after paying for all of the rights, including those relating to copyrights, is left with a copy of the work in or on a particular medium for which the consumer paid, but no method for accessing that work. The same is true in other situations where there may be no issues of obsolescence. For example, with respect to a copy of a work where the medium is damaged and the consumer has no way of properly accessing the work or accessing the work in its undamaged state or unadulterated manner, there should be a way for the owner to access the work. Also, in the situation where the owner purchases a new media device, such as, for example, a MP3 player, or wishes to utilize or have access to the work in a different format or different location other than the original copy or the original medium, such as, for example, on a computer, PDA or other portable or stationary device, the owner should be able to utilize or access the work. Additionally, where a consumer wants to create a backup copy of a work for archival purposes, while the costs for CD or DVD burners have decreased over time, there is still the need for a computer, which many people do not have, to allow reproductions of CDs or DVDs.
Since the rights holders in works of authorship have a legitimate interest in ensuring that they are properly remunerated by parties that desire to have access to their works, it is important that any copying or reproducing of such works or authorship be accomplished legitimately and only for allowable purposes, such as archival/backup of the original copy of the work, for purposes of time shifting or for purposes of having unfettered access to the work, e.g., in a different format, for example copying from CD to cassette.
However, once the medium in which a work is stored is damaged there is no method for transferring the work to the same or different type of medium so as to preserve the copy or embodiment of the work purchased by the consumer. Additionally, there is no method for allowing the consumer access to the purchased work, while ensuring that the rights holders' interests in the works are adequately protected, for example, by receiving compensation for access to their works.